The issues affecting the release of the film aren't really to do with any supposed "awfulness". It's more down to the fact that the US distributor, the Weinstein company, wasn't happy with the final [director's] cut and after its suggestions were ignored, made its own re-edited version. However, without the approval of the director it cannot distribute that version in the United States and such approval has not been forthcoming.

The worst case scenario is that neither version is distributed in the US but that isn't an obstacle to other companies distributing the director's original version of the film to any other market in the world. Those members living close enough may be able to nip over the border to Canada or Mexico if they want to see the film in a theatre.

What it boils down to is the power of the company contracted to distribute a film having a direct influence over the finished product. In earlier days this power resided with the producers and the studios; today the distributor, if powerful enough, is demanding that its view not just be heard, but acted upon.

...until yesterday it looked as if Weinstein would pull out of his £3million deal to distribute the film in the U.S. unless he was allowed to screen his edit. Dahan, meanwhile, implies that he’s the victim.

Those who have seen both versions talk about a film which is hard to follow, and a focus on mid-century French politics that is really not very commercial. Kidman, it seems, is ‘all right’ in the film, but reports suggest that despite impressive focus on the clothes, the jewels and the interiors, she doesn’t make the actress Grace Kelly, and her life in Monaco, believable.

...In the film, Rainier...is portrayed as overbearing, cruel and absent. There is also a subplot in the film involving Rainier’s sister, Princess Antoinette, in which she conspires with French President Charles De Gaulle to plot a coup to seize control of Monaco - which is, as far as anyone knows, a complete fabrication.

The other problem is that the movie that director Dahan turned in was just not acceptable to the film’s U.S. distributor Harvey Weinstein, either. It seems the spectre of last year’s Dianamovie - about her affair with surgeon Hasnat Khan - which flopped badly, weighs heavily on his mind. Weinstein was not involved in Diana, and with Grace of Monaco he had hoped to get a fascinating portrait of period politics and romance - the sort of upscale Oscar-winning fare in which he specialises. Think of Stephen Frears’ film The Queen, which garnered Dame Helen Mirren an Oscar in 2006. Instead what he has reminds him more of Diana, the critically-savaged film that earned around £2million on a budget of nearly £20 million. No wonder he’s taken fright.

The relationship between Dahan and Weinstein started to sour last spring, when Dahan, best known for the Edith Piaf biopic La Vie En Rose, delivered the film to Harvey. Weinstein thought it was too melodramatic, and too dark, and sent Dahan notes on the film, as is usual. He also started cutting a version on his own for the U.S. market - which is not so usual, because he was seriously alarmed. But when Dahan saw it he was furious.

The re-edited Grace film was privately previewed in New York in September and I’m told that it still scored poorly. Viewers felt the structure was a mess and that it was hard to follow. Then there was a re-edit of Weinstein’s cut, involving extra shooting, but the result is still said to be lacklustre. An insider commented: ‘It’s not brilliant, it’s passable. It’s not an award winner.’ While Weinstein has tried to cut the film into a light fairy tale, the director’s version is more about pain and sadness, even though they are both from the same script.

A deal was worked out so Weinstein could release his version in the U.S. while the director’s cut would come to French cinemas. However in January that fell apart when Weinstein put off an agreed March release date, saying the picture was ‘not ready’. Soon after it was announced that Grace Of Monaco - the French version, approved by Dahan - was going to open the Cannes film festival. Weinstein was furious and began trying to renegotiate his rights fee with the film’s financier. He wanted to pay £2million rather than £3million, citing broken promises on the part of the French filmmakers, and added costs incurred by the new cut. Now, according to Nicole Kidman there has been an 11th-hour compromise.*

But has there ever been a more ill-omened opening to a film festival? Or a greater embarrassment for a leading lady?

* the article contained no further details regarding the "11th hour compromise".

As i read it in this article the depiction of Rainier and Antoinette is at the heart of the movie, so imo the Grimaldi family will never approve no matter which cut is used for screening...

The hidden concept is clear: a brave, stunningly beautiful American pious Catholic lady finding herself trapped into the web of filthy European monsters. King Kong and that screaming white lady, rewritten to fit at the Côte d'Azur.

In the interview Princess Stéphanie focusses on her father, the late Prince Rainier III. She described him as "un grand homme" and effectively the greatest objection was how her father was portrayed in the movie. We all tend to focus on the iconic personage of Grace Kelly. For the children their father Prince Rainier was -of course- equally important.

Reviews are in. And no surprise, they are terrible:
"...Handsomely produced but as dramatically inert as star Nicole Kidman’s frigid cheek muscles...sort of misbegotten venture no amount of clever re-editing could hope to improve... a trumped-up teacup tempest... the actress never appears to fully connect with the character, delivering a series of doleful little-girl-lost poses — and, later, pantomimed iron-jawed determination — ...o one comes away with a very good sense of how Grace Kelly looked, but precious little sense of how she felt, about her husband, her children (barely glimpsed here) or her adopted homeland."

I can't believe how awful her face is. She didn't look like that in "The Railway Man". She was lovely.

Absolutely agree!

Why does she think she needs to do this to herself? She is being ridiculed left, right and center for it and she does not need to!! Someone wake her up before she ends up (permanently) looking like a total freak!!

Radio this morning was having a go at the critics. They were also saying that there must be some kind of curse for any actress that portrays a dead royal.